


Sansa & Arya

by DottyDot



Series: What We Do Not Say [1]
Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Internal Monologue, POV Second Person, Sisters, s7
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-03
Updated: 2019-03-03
Packaged: 2019-11-08 19:05:55
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,013
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17986895
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DottyDot/pseuds/DottyDot
Summary: There are so many things you want to tell her, you want to scream, and throw things, and act as she always had as a child: free. Free to say and do what she wanted, but you have never been free; you don't know how.





	Sansa & Arya

 

 

  
There are many things you do not say. You are good at not saying these things, they sit on your tongue, held in only by your teeth and closed lips. You smile instead, walk away, make an excuse, or bite your tongue into silence. The things you do not say eventually roll deeper into your throat and then finally you eat them and they're just another invisible part of you that no one knows. You wait and keep waiting, eventually the desire to throw out your thoughts and feelings will go away. Crying and shouting isn't you anymore, not since that happy child you were died. Not since pretty clothes meant unwelcome touches. Not since existing meant people wanted your home or your body or the children they threatened to force you to bear. No, now you are a woman, dressed in dark greys, now men walk behind you and listen to you. You drink your tears to help swallow down the words that you won't let yourself say. It is the only way.

You are not impulse and need; your are ice and steel.

Until you aren't.

She's here, you know she's here, and they can't tell you who or where but you know it's her and you know where and you're in the crypts in a moment and she's there, the last part of your life that _was_ is here _now_. Everything you had fought for, to have your family safe has been worth it because your baby sister is standing there before you. You are so moved by this new reality, that three of your siblings now live that you have to hold yourself together, not because you will fall, but because you will rise and fly or float away on something you haven't felt since those days when the worst part of life was fighting with her. She is so beautiful and she's there, but she's cold, and then she laughs and you are so warmed by this sound that you think you will simply live in it. Hugging her, she has to be the most beautiful thing you've ever held, the most important thing, maybe the only thing. No, that's ridiculous, you have Bran and Jon. But Bran is not Bran, not anymore, and Jon is gone, as much as you love him, he's gone.

The happiness, the thrill of having your little sister and brother back is shaken almost immediately by the reality that somehow, they are more changed by their experiences than either you or Jon. Or, perhaps not changed more, but new notes have been added and their discordant, when played, it's almost like someone has dropped a harp instead of run their fingers gently across it. But these children who have no innocence are you in so many ways, and they are _yours_. They are here, and Arya always did love Jon best, maybe it will all be well once he is back.

Arya is no longer a wild girl, all of her hate has been drawn together, forming daggers she throws at you, she frightens you. What used to run free and leave her open, has pulled within her and is silently waiting. You tell her to talk, to speak her mind, she wants to play games.

Her game doesn't involve one cut, it's a thousand in a look, in a few words, she's reached in between cracks you thought you'd sealed, and she's pulled you to pieces before you knew she'd begun. You thought you were safe, that she was safe, but she had a knife and wants to use it. You know, whatever she says, she needs to use that knife. You leave, but know it isn't over. None of it ends. Every good feeling dies as soon as you recognize it, every bad thing comes back, just in a new form.

She's staring at you, dark eyes that remind you of Jon, but she's not like Jon at all. There's no warmth or understanding, she's acting like you wanted to stand there and watch your father die. She's acting like the next year of your life wasn't an endless loop, of that moment's pain, just elaborated, given more parts, slowed down, sped up, played softly then louder.

There are so many things you want to tell her, you want to scream, and throw things, and act as she always had as a child: free. Free to say and do what she wanted, but you have never been free; you don't know how.

You want to ask if her betrothed forced her to stand, staring into your father's dead eyes, because seeing your suffering made him happy. Did she ever look into warm grey eyes gone blind? Did she want to ask for forgiveness father could no longer give? Did she have to pray every day that her body wouldn't betray her, that her moon blood wouldn't come, for fear that Joffrey would rape her? Force her to bear his children? Did she have to stand before the court as her clothes were ripped from her body, and a knight in a white cloak beat her with his sword? Did she become the embodiment of the Northern rebellion and made to suffer for it? Did she pay for every battle won with more bruises, yet another cut? Was every Northern victory measured out in her blood?

Of course not, and she would never understand. Yours was every hell in one, a nightmare that took every girlish dream and turned it into terror. Arya doesn't know, she can't know what it was like, what you did to survive. How you professed your love for that bastard king so many times to save yourself, and how each time you wished you had killed him when you had the chance. You would have been happy to die if he had died first. You didn't kill him, and you think, Arya would have. That is why you disgust her. You saved yourself with the right words, she would have died with blood in her hands. She does not understand someone like you.

You were taught to obey, to be good, to give babies to some lord or a prince. You were never intended for anything else. You weren't supposed to be near violence or blood, but that's all you've known since you left home. Even when you escaped King's Landing you weren't safe. Your aunt tried to kill you because Petyr loved your mother and decided you were the closest he could get. Then he murdered your aunt and you protected him because you needed him to protect you. But Arya wouldn't understand that, she can protect herself.

She wouldn't understand how he took you from one family who murdered your family and gave you to another family that murdered your family. Arya wouldn't have allowed herself to be given. She would never have smiled at Roose Bolton, never married his bastard son. You did, because you wanted Winterfell. And you got it, but now, what it was is lost to you forever. Arya still has a place in her head marked home, and she gets to come home. Bran and Jon still have it too. But you? Worse was done to you within Winterfell than ever was done before.

When you walk these halls you don't see mother or father, you see _him_. You don't hear Bran and Rickon's laughter, you hear _him_ , as if he's behind you or hiding in the shadows, always waiting for you.  
  
You weren't a soldier, you never visited the training yard, you didn't want to be an assassin, but you know the force of a man's blade. You know what it feels like for a knife to cut through your skin as if you're no more than someone else's dinner, as if all you are is meat for carving. You know what it is to want to die because what's coming to you is worse. You never had a weapon to defend yourself, you had only words and tears, and near the end, you couldn't even find those anymore.

And it isn't over, you haven't been rescued from your troubles, you're not safely hidden away in your castle, you still have to protect the man responsible for selling you to that monster because Jon needs soldiers for his army, and he won't have an army if Petyr isn't here. So you smile, and you let him touch you, his breath spread across your face, you let him kiss you, because while you were told you would be Queen and bring honor to your family, all you ever became was a whore, trying not to sell so many pieces of yourself that there is nothing left that anyone wants.

You want to tell Arya to take her revenge, to take your face. It's the only place on your body that hasn't been cut already. But as she clutches her trophies and dreams of murder, she will know that those deaths didn't save you or her or Jon. Winning Winterfell back is why she and Bran and Jon and you are safe, as safe as any of you can be. And Jon left you in charge not because you've been a sweet, little sister, and not just because you have a name that means something to the Northern Lords, he left you in charge because you took your home back with your own body. You didn't ask anyone to do what you hadn't already done. You bled for the North, and you all must before it is through.

The stones that will rebuild these walls were made with the blood of your father, your mother, your brother, and you. In the rooms of your home are stones bathed in your blood, blood spilt to reclaim the North in the only way you could. You are the blood of Winterfell, not because of who your father is, but because of who _you are_.

You were here not so many months ago telling another girl who threatened you that she couldn't scare you, and you want to tell Arya the same. She can run around with her knives and her bag of faces and her list of people to kill. She can call you traitor and usurper all she wants, but you are Sansa Stark of Winterfell. This is your home, and she can't frighten you.

But you don't say that, you don't say any of that, because she would never understand. What she does understand is blood, and when the time is right, when the Lords demand justice, you allow her to drain the blood from Petyr. He falls into it, swimming in blood, the blood of your father, whom he betrayed, the blood of your aunt and Ser Dontos who he murdered with his own hands, the blood of the Northerners who rode to the war he helped create. Your mother, Robb, Rickon, it is their blood too, and you would see him drown in it. It is not your blood today, no, Petyr has no taste of you upon his death, he whines and chokes, but you will live.

Arya stands in your spot now, and you in Jon's, and you wait for him to return. There will be more blood, more giants to overthrow, but you have killed together, and now you will live together. There are no hugs or laughter, no ease of comfort, but there is understanding, and soon, trust. No wrinkles on her face display the unrest beneath the surface. Her fear and longing she conceals well, almost as well as you. There is no saving her now, no saving you. You will choose the prey, and Arya will cut her down. You will hunt with the pack.

She is so small, her reach not far but far enough. She frightens you, you frustrate her, yet, she is more yours and you more hers than ever before. Snarls and bites will not break you; your coldness cannot chase her away. She is your dearest self.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> I love both the Stark sisters, and this is not intended to be an attack on Arya. I just wanted to think about how Sansa must have felt during s7 dealing with her. I hope to write a second part from Arya's POV.


End file.
